Improvised explosive devices have claimed the lives and limbs of thousands of American soldiers across Iraq and Afghanistan.

And now officials say the devilish devices are posing a growing threat across Texas and the United States.

The accused shooter in the Aurora, Colo., movie theater massacre, James Holmes, allegedly deployed IEDs in his apartment, prompting federal law enforcement agencies to look into possible links to domestic or foreign-based terrorism.

The incident follows disrupted IED attacks in 2010 — a car bomb disarmed in New York City’s Times Square and explosives detected in ink cartridges aboard two U.S.-bound commercial cargo planes.

And with Mexican drug cartels using car bombs in cities bordering Texas, officials along the southwest border are increasingly concerned about ready-to-go devices being smuggled into the United States.

“The domestic IED threat from both homegrown terrorists and global threat networks is real and presents a significant security challenge for the United States and our international partners,” Army Lt. Gen. Michael Barbero, director of the Pentagon’s so-called Joint Improvised Explosive Device Defeat Organization, warned Congress in classified testimony in mid-July.